ninja nexus —

Google Nexus tablet pops up on benchmark site

Apparently sporting a Tegra 3 processor and a 1280x768 display.

The Google Nexus tablet may have made a guest appearance on a benchmark result site a month ahead of its anticipated release, according to Android Police. The tablet, named "Nexus 7" in the benchmark results, appears to use a Tegra 3 processor and is likely to debut at Google I/O in June.

Rumors about the Nexus tablet have been swirling for the last few months, with the Wall Street Journal reporting in March that Google planned to create an inexpensive 7-inch device to complete with Amazon's $199 Kindle Fire. The tablet would ostensibly be the company's flagship, an analog to the Galaxy Nexus, and possibly sold directly from Google's recently relaunched hardware store.

The telling benchmarks come from Basemark ES2.0 Taiji from Rightware, and show a device named "Nexus 7" manufactured by "asus." Presumably, the 7 points to the device's screen size, which showed a resolution of 1280x768. The benchmarks also indicated it sported a quad-core Cortex A9 NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor clocked at 1.3GHz alongside an NVIDIA ULA GeForce GPU. The device was running Android version 4.1 JRN51B; Android Police speculates that the J stands for "Jelly Bean," meaning that that iteration of the OS may not carry the 5.0 version number after all.

Sources speaking to TechnoBuffalo on May 24 indicated that the tablet would be made by Asus (correct, if the above benchmarks are real), would be priced at $200, and that it would be announced during the Google I/O conference taking place from June 27 to June 29. TechnoBuffalo also points out there is a strong possibility that Google will provide developers in attendance with hardware samples of the new device, as it did with the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 in 2011.

Casey Johnston
Casey Johnston is the former Culture Editor at Ars Technica, and now does the occasional freelance story. She graduated from Columbia University with a degree in Applied Physics. Twitter@caseyjohnston

33 Reader Comments

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy). If you wanted to control the "whole widget," you shouldn't have developed Android as an open source environment.

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy). If you wanted to control the "whole widget," you shouldn't have developed Android as an open source environment.

If you were a Google hardware partner, you should kick yourself for having such poor offerings that Google has been forced to get into the hardware market in order to give its platform a better chance. The better Android phones have been the ones that Google does. The Android tablets need a kick in the pants. Here's hoping Google gives it one.

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy). If you wanted to control the "whole widget," you shouldn't have developed Android as an open source environment.

If you were a Google hardware partner, you should kick yourself for having such poor offerings that Google has been forced to get into the hardware market in order to give its platform a better chance. The better Android phones have been the ones that Google does. The Android tablets need a kick in the pants. Here's hoping Google gives it one.

This is a valid point, but I'm not certain how the Google tablet, as described, accomplishes that. It is sized and spec'ed similarly to other hardware partner's offerings; it will likely be inexpensive, that's a plus -- and could potentially be more "open" in function than the Fire (but without the Fire's tightly integrated userland environment -- a negative?)

But again, my point is what limits Android tablets so far doesn't seem to be the hardware: The hardware is quite good, and diverse. Samsung's tablets offer focus on design and quality of construction; Asus, Toshiba, Lenovo, etc. focus on "specs" and a variety of configurations to support a diverse marketplace and set of needs not met by Samsung's "our way or the highway" hardware design approach; the Fire is inexpensive and comes attached to one of the most consumer-friendly brands there is.

If Google challenged itself to iterate the Android environment faster with an Apple-level of focus on user experience, it would raise all boats and reduce the need for the array of marketplace-clogging userland environments and content sources (of course, I'm making an assumption here that while the market is served by a diversity of hardware, it's not served by a diversity of userland environments, and I could see how some could disagree).

I guess I could understand Google's efforts with the Nexus line as "reference" platforms, but then I would assume the sales expectations should be very low.

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy).

The problem is that none of Google's hardware partners can resist the urge to tinker with Android, adding skins that slow down the OS and the release of updates, make it less stable, and change the UI when it was fine to begin with.

I have a love/hate relationship with my Galaxy Nexus. The radio is much worse than my Motorola Droid's, so I have to use WiFi at home, where I have a marginal signal, to maintain a data connection. Battery life is atrocious. The GPS takes forever to get a lock. But, after having used Ice Cream Sandwich, there's no going back. As much as I would love a RAZR MAXX for its superior radio performance and battery life, the indeterminate date for the ICS update, an undoubtedly very late or nonexistent Jelly Bean update, and the assurance that both will have BLUR, make it a nonstarter.

Rumors about the Nexus tablet have been swirling for the last few months, with the Wall Street Journal reporting in March that Google planned to create an inexpensive 7-inch device to complete with Amazon's $199 Kindle Fire.

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy). If you wanted to control the "whole widget," you shouldn't have developed Android as an open source environment.

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy). If you wanted to control the "whole widget," you shouldn't have developed Android as an open source environment.

They seem to be fine with it so far, to the point HTC/Samsung/whoever seems happy to line up to build Nexus devices. It's probably a good money winner, no need to try customise the device to make it your own, less supporting it required, little flack if the entire thing blows up because Google did something stupid.

Plus it's not like they're stealing market share from any of their hardware partners, no one has been able to sell a tablet with Android besides Amazon anyway. And the coin has two sides, becoming a "hardware partner" to a company selling an open source OS is a terrible idea if you want some kind of exclusivity to it.

Definitely, the target user of the Kindle Fire is different than of this hypothetical Nexus 7. The question this thing will answer is whether there is a market at the moment for an open 7" tablet computer with decent vendor* OS support. While I personally love the idea I'm not actually convinced that there is a big market for that today, but then I didn't think the iPad would amount to much either so what do I know.

I have a love/hate relationship with my Galaxy Nexus. ... Battery life is atrocious. The GPS takes forever to get a lock. But, after having used Ice Cream Sandwich, there's no going back.

That sucks. My 3G Galaxy Nexus gets a GPS lock pretty much instantaneously and always gets more then 24 hours on the battery. What is sucking down the battery? Battery life on networked phones can pretty touchy. I upgraded my Courier IMAP server to Dovecot with an IMAP idle time set to 25 minutes and almost doubled the battery life on my old vibrant.

Have to agree on the ICS. I personally plan on only buying stock android devices from now on. The custom skins only bring issues.

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy). If you wanted to control the "whole widget," you shouldn't have developed Android as an open source environment.

If you were a Google hardware partner, you should kick yourself for having such poor offerings that Google has been forced to get into the hardware market in order to give its platform a better chance. The better Android phones have been the ones that Google does. The Android tablets need a kick in the pants. Here's hoping Google gives it one.

This is a valid point, but I'm not certain how the Google tablet, as described, accomplishes that. It is sized and spec'ed similarly to other hardware partner's offerings; it will likely be inexpensive, that's a plus -- and could potentially be more "open" in function than the Fire (but without the Fire's tightly integrated userland environment -- a negative?)

But again, my point is what limits Android tablets so far doesn't seem to be the hardware: The hardware is quite good, and diverse. Samsung's tablets offer focus on design and quality of construction; Asus, Toshiba, Lenovo, etc. focus on "specs" and a variety of configurations to support a diverse marketplace and set of needs not met by Samsung's "our way or the highway" hardware design approach; the Fire is inexpensive and comes attached to one of the most consumer-friendly brands there is.

If Google challenged itself to iterate the Android environment faster with an Apple-level of focus on user experience, it would raise all boats and reduce the need for the array of marketplace-clogging userland environments and content sources (of course, I'm making an assumption here that while the market is served by a diversity of hardware, it's not served by a diversity of userland environments, and I could see how some could disagree).

I guess I could understand Google's efforts with the Nexus line as "reference" platforms, but then I would assume the sales expectations should be very low.

EDIT: Clarifications, Typos

I don't think the problems with Android tablets are the hardware - there's tons of really great ones out there with specs and features that blow iPads out of the water - it's the price. At the same price an iPad costs ($400+ depending on the model), most people figure "might as well get the iPad if I'm paying that much." Amazon with the Kindle Fire proved that if you sell a halfway decent tablet for $250, you'll sell boatloads of them.

Personally I wanted a tablet with higher specs and more connectivity options like micro-SD and USB, so I got an Asus Transformer with the keyboard dock (love my Transformer.) But as an example, my mom had been wanting a tablet for a while, but she ended up getting a Kindle Fire. (And then ended up a bit disappointed when she couldn't get some of the Google apps from the Google Play store - yes I realize you can hack it to load the Play store, but since she lives 150 miles away, I wanted to leave it stock so I wouldn't have to support the new non-stock configuration.) But I think she's generally satisfied with the features that the Fire does have.

I think Google saw how well Amazon did with the Fire, and wants to demonstrate that the same could be done with a vanilla Android tablet. If this new Nexus tablet has decent specs and isn't missing some important features like GPS (like the Kindle Fire), I'd definitely consider getting one for my wife.

Definitely, the target user of the Kindle Fire is different than of this hypothetical Nexus 7. The question this thing will answer is whether there is a market at the moment for an open 7" tablet computer with decent vendor* OS support. While I personally love the idea I'm not actually convinced that there is a big market for that today, but then I didn't think the iPad would amount to much either so what do I know.

* Vendor being more Google than Asus.

Both Google and Asus have a great track record for Android update support in my experience. I've lost track of the number of updates I've gotten for my Transformer - it's up to at least 10 updates since I got it late last year, including ICS in February and I think three minor updates since then (I think it's currently on Android v4.0.3, which is newer than my Galaxy Nexus at 4.0.2 - all reports are that Verizon is dragging its heels on updating the Nexus to 4.0.3 or 4.0.4, but the update has been available from Google for months.)

I have a love/hate relationship with my Galaxy Nexus. ... Battery life is atrocious. The GPS takes forever to get a lock. But, after having used Ice Cream Sandwich, there's no going back.

That sucks. My 3G Galaxy Nexus gets a GPS lock pretty much instantaneously and always gets more then 24 hours on the battery. What is sucking down the battery? Battery life on networked phones can pretty touchy. I upgraded my Courier IMAP server to Dovecot with an IMAP idle time set to 25 minutes and almost doubled the battery life on my old vibrant.

Have to agree on the ICS. I personally plan on only buying stock android devices from now on. The custom skins only bring issues.

It's the 4G, period. I find when I'm at home and turn on the WiFi on my Verizon Galaxy Nexus, I get much better battery life than when I use 4G. At least the battery life isn't as bad as my wife's HTC Thunderbolt: when you turn on 4G, it literally gets maximum of 5 hours battery life, and that's not even using it for much. So I turned off the 4G, and it can actually last an entire day, although just barely.

Agreed on the ICS. I can't go back to either Gingerbread or Honeycomb, they seem so primitive in relation to ICS. It's just the huge number of little things they fixed or improved, and it looks so much better and more modern. And the only Android devices I've owned have been stock Android (Motorola Droid, Galaxy Nexus) or very light customization (Asus Transformer) - I've heard such negative things about the different manufacturer customizations.

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy). If you wanted to control the "whole widget," you shouldn't have developed Android as an open source environment.

As a customer, I am glad Google is trying to offer something that none of the manufacturers seem to be willing to do : vanilla Android (yes, Asus is better than most, but only for the ATP). I think manufacturers need to compete on, gasp, PHYSICAL differences b/c I'm not convinced we've found the ideal tablet yet (from a form factor/features perspective). Since these manufacturers aren't addressing the complaints of the consumers (i.e., using better screens, more solid construction, longer battery, etc), then there is a clear market for someone to do this on the Android side. After all, why should Google let Android languish if the manufacturers refuse to give the customers what they want? I can tell you with some confidence that simply doesn't care about getting into hardware. All they want is for Android to thrive in all ways (including customer satisfaction so that people will continue to buy into the Google system).The problem the manufacturers have is that they are in an ossified industry. There appears to be little incentive to do anything other than what they currently do, if they are even modestly successful. They are incredibly risk averse. So instead they make these skins which have massive code bases and are often of marginal, if any, value and use that for differentiation. That is odd to say the least. For one thing, software of the type they are trying to create isn't a core skill for them (of manufacturers I'd say Htc is far and away the best in this area). What they need to do is actually manufacture differences. Use a good screen, camera, battery, solid construction (and not necessarily "unibody" since that is of very suspect value in a device which is often dropped), and GREAT drivers (something Apple is better at than any Android OEM, to my knowledge). Now, within those parameters there is much choice, so there is plenty of room for differentiation if they choose.Lastly, Google needs to foundationalise Android. Completely open development at all times (obviously excluding the Google apps and things like that). This would let others, especially companies, see the code and contribute should they so choose. The OEMs would no longer have the excuse of not having enouh lead time to implement said release, and favoritism charges would be impossible. Google could still be in charge by maintaining commit rights, if they so choose, and thus not feel like they are losing control.The only problem is that some want these developments to be secret so they can have presentations lioe Apple does where they expose these features to an admiring world all at once. However, is that necessary? Are the gains of that worth this fragmentation and customer disatisfaction?

Ugh. 1280x768? Do we really need another resolution? Why not keep the 1280x800 standard?

It wouldn't surpise me if its using those extra 48 pixels for the on screen controls, hence an effective resolution of 1280x720 (for all the devs) since the controls need to be on screen at all times (even with full screen apps). What I'm curious about is where they got the screen from. I would've expected to have heard something about a large order of that reolution screen.

As a customer, I am glad Google is trying to offer something that none of the manufacturers seem to be willing to do : vanilla Android (yes, Asus is better than most, but only for the ATP). I think manufacturers need to compete on, gasp, PHYSICAL differences b/c I'm not convinced we've found the ideal tablet yet (from a form factor/features perspective). Since these manufacturers aren't addressing the complaints of the consumers (i.e., using better screens, more solid construction, longer battery, etc), then there is a clear market for someone to do this on the Android side. After all, why should Google let Android languish if the manufacturers refuse to give the customers what they want? I can tell you with some confidence that simply doesn't care about getting into hardware. All they want is for Android to thrive in all ways (including customer satisfaction so that people will continue to buy into the Google system).The problem the manufacturers have is that they are in an ossified industry. There appears to be little incentive to do anything other than what they currently do, if they are even modestly successful. They are incredibly risk averse. So instead they make these skins which have massive code bases and are often of marginal, if any, value and use that for differentiation. That is odd to say the least. For one thing, software of the type they are trying to create isn't a core skill for them (of manufacturers I'd say Htc is far and away the best in this area). What they need to do is actually manufacture differences. Use a good screen, camera, battery, solid construction (and not necessarily "unibody" since that is of very suspect value in a device which is often dropped), and GREAT drivers (something Apple is better at than any Android OEM, to my knowledge). Now, within those parameters there is much choice, so there is plenty of room for differentiation if they choose.Lastly, Google needs to foundationalise Android. Completely open development at all times (obviously excluding the Google apps and things like that). This would let others, especially companies, see the code and contribute should they so choose. The OEMs would no longer have the excuse of not having enouh lead time to implement said release, and favoritism charges would be impossible. Google could still be in charge by maintaining commit rights, if they so choose, and thus not feel like they are losing control.The only problem is that some want these developments to be secret so they can have presentations lioe Apple does where they expose these features to an admiring world all at once. However, is that necessary? Are the gains of that worth this fragmentation and customer disatisfaction?

I really like your viewpoint. I tried stock android without sense on my HTC sensation running 4.0.3. Oddly enough, it gained the menu option to encrypt the data on the phone (on sense it only had the option to do the sd card). But then I lost the cool HTC phone features common to all platforms they sell, which is it automatically makes the ringtone/notifications louder if it knows it is in a pocket, or turns on the speaker phone if flipped over, and my favorite, it quiets down when I pick up while ringing. That, and it has music controls on the lock screen. Then, stock android couldn't do a static image over each home screen (i could with a 3rd party enhanced stock launcher, but it still couldn't crop right since it wants to crop the standard way).

Stock was way faster, smoother, and probably has more battery life. But, I couldn't live without the enhancements of Sense 3.6.

Ugh. 1280x768? Do we really need another resolution? Why not keep the 1280x800 standard?

It wouldn't surpise me if its using those extra 48 pixels for the on screen controls, hence an effective resolution of 1280x720 (for all the devs) since the controls need to be on screen at all times (even with full screen apps). What I'm curious about is where they got the screen from. I would've expected to have heard something about a large order of that reolution screen.

Hmm... perhaps it is the other way around...

Maybe it is a 1280x800 screen. 32 of those pixels are for the controls (hence the 768 reporting). On my Galaxy Nexus, the on-screen controls disappear when doing full-screen video.

Sorry, I'm waiting for a competent Win 8 tablet. Android is a real bitch of an OS. How many years now and the best solution to resolving the constant Media error popup is to reflash the stock OS (IT'S ALREADY A STOCK OS!!!) or you deleted something (I DID NO SUCH THING!!!).

or how utterly broken the gallery is in Android. Oh you don't want every png, jpeg, gif and image file to show up in gallery? go into file structure and put a .nomedia file into every directory you don't want the gallery to read from. WAT. THA. FARK.

Google needs to just stfu and actually write better software instead of wasting money and energy on experiments.

I really like your viewpoint. I tried stock android without sense on my HTC sensation running 4.0.3. Oddly enough, it gained the menu option to encrypt the data on the phone (on sense it only had the option to do the sd card). But then I lost the cool HTC phone features common to all platforms they sell, which is it automatically makes the ringtone/notifications louder if it knows it is in a pocket, or turns on the speaker phone if flipped over, and my favorite, it quiets down when I pick up while ringing. That, and it has music controls on the lock screen. Then, stock android couldn't do a static image over each home screen (i could with a 3rd party enhanced stock launcher, but it still couldn't crop right since it wants to crop the standard way).

Stock was way faster, smoother, and probably has more battery life. But, I couldn't live without the enhancements of Sense 3.6.

Thanks. I feel pretty strongly about this, especially since the direction (if not the exact steps) forward is pretty clear. Also, my comment was directed towards the middle to upper end of the market. The lower end could also be improved at fairly low cost, but the limits there are much more set.As you've said, Sense has some nice ideas (I wasn't even aware of the "pocket detector") and a very good design sense, imho. Motorola also has some great ideas (the various smart tools that are pretty much what Tasker offers, but wrapped up nicely and easy to use), and I hope Google integrates some of them.Regarding the homescreen wallpaper, I assumed you tried GO Launcher, and have seen this link (http://www.droidforums.net/forum/htc-th ... creen.html)?

Feature wise, yes, built in hdmi and usb is nice too, but the performance just doesn't seem to be that stellar on the Android side, and then there is the lack of tailored software that continues to be an issue.

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy). If you wanted to control the "whole widget," you shouldn't have developed Android as an open source environment.

I would be pissed at the pathetic job the OEM's have done in supporting Android and their lack of supplying upstream contributions to the source code. These leeches seem to like to keep all the good stuff for themselves without giving back. With Motorola now part of Google it's about time Google got their share of the pie instead of these leeches eating all of it. It's going to be nice seeing Motorola emerge as the preferred hardware for the true Android experience while these OEM clowns continue with their pathetic skinning.

If I were a Google hardware partner, I would be entirely pissed off that Google can't keep its nose out of hardware sales. Focus on software, Google: It's your driving strength, and you bring things to the table no one else does (and I say this as an Apple fanboy).

The problem is that none of Google's hardware partners can resist the urge to tinker with Android, adding skins that slow down the OS and the release of updates, make it less stable, and change the UI when it was fine to begin with.

I have a love/hate relationship with my Galaxy Nexus. The radio is much worse than my Motorola Droid's, so I have to use WiFi at home, where I have a marginal signal, to maintain a data connection. Battery life is atrocious. The GPS takes forever to get a lock. But, after having used Ice Cream Sandwich, there's no going back. As much as I would love a RAZR MAXX for its superior radio performance and battery life, the indeterminate date for the ICS update, an undoubtedly very late or nonexistent Jelly Bean update, and the assurance that both will have BLUR, make it a nonstarter.

Are you on verizon? If so it sounds like you have a defective Galaxy Nexus. My first Gnex on verizon was like yours... horrible radio which in turn caused horrible battery life. I had them swap it out with a new one after a week and that one works great.. radio is excellent and battery life is good

Feature wise, yes, built in hdmi and usb is nice too, but the performance just doesn't seem to be that stellar on the Android side, and then there is the lack of tailored software that continues to be an issue.

Apple does put powerful GPUs in the ipads... however the newer android tablets (like the TF Prime) have more powerful CPUs... of course Ipads don't really need to be as powerful on the CPU side since they are far more limited from a multitasking perspective and on a few other fronts

Ugh. 1280x768? Do we really need another resolution? Why not keep the 1280x800 standard?

Indeed 15:9 is an odd aspect ratio, though still a bit better than the typical TV-centric garbage. However, perhaps it is just another one of those cursed 1366x768 screens with the end lopped off for a permanent button bar or something.

While I like the 16:10 aspect of 1280x800, I'd rather have better pixel density on new tablets. 1280x800 should be relegated to phone territory, and we should have 2560x1600 or better on larger displays.